10 Affirmations Every Aspiring Entrepreneur Needs To Read

Every aspiring entrepreneur knows the rush of excitement that overtakes you when you come up with a really great idea. But unfortunately, most entrepreneurs rarely make it past the ideation stage.

If you want to take your idea from concept to reality, follow these 10 things all successful entrepreneurs do.

1. Make a commitment.

Committing to your entrepreneurial goal may seem like a simple, insignificant concept. However, it’s actually deeply rooted in psychology and can help you reap powerful rewards. In psychologist Robert Cialdini’s book Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion

, he says that when you commit, orally or in writing, to an idea or goal, you are more likely to honor that commitment. So commit to doing whatever you need to in order to make your dream come to fruition.

Advertising

2. Trust the journey.

There’s always a lag between doing something new and seeing results. So focus on the journey. Set your goal, then forget about it. Do the day-to-day things that most people aren’t willing to do. This is the secret to being a successful entrepreneur: taking daily action that compounds into huge gains over time.

3. Stay hungry.

It’s easy to get complacent with entrepreneurship. This is especially true for aspiring entrepreneurs who finally achieve some level of success. Always stay hungry though. Don’t rest on your laurels and get lazy. Keep continuously improving and looking for ways to grow.

4. Expect to fail.

Failure is inevitable for entrepreneurs. But how you handle failure has a huge impact on your potential success down the road. Successful entrepreneurs embrace failure and even expect it. They learn from each of these experiences and find a better way of doing things the next time around.

Advertising

5. Believe in your vision.

A lot of aspiring entrepreneurs give up when times become difficult. The ones who achieve greatness believe wholeheartedly in what they’re doing and never give up.

6. Be a problem solver.

Successful entrepreneurs welcome problems because they know these are opportunities to use the skills they’ve developed. So embrace problems and don’t expect immediate gratification. Being solution-oriented is good, but being problem-oriented is even better.

7. Ask for help.

Successful entrepreneurs don’t achieve success by going at it alone. Most have mentors and a network of people they turn to for advice and help. So reach out to people you respect and ask them to help you. If there’s someone who you don’t know personally but think can help your entrepreneurial journey, get your foot in the door with him/her by interacting with them on their website or social media feeds.

Advertising

8. Follow the steps of those before you.

Aspiring entrepreneurs should study the people who are successful in their field and emulate those actions. What do those people do differently? What are the unique things they do to connect with people, market themselves, differentiate their work, etc.? You can learn a massive amount of valuable information about an entrepreneur’s journey (for free) by simply going to his/her website and spending some time doing a little research.

9. Learn everything you can.

, he says, “The future belongs to those who learn more skills and combine them in creative ways.” Aspiring entrepreneurs learn something new every day. They attend conferences, read books, magazines, and websites, talk to people, and watch videos. These are the things that people who master their craft do.

Advertising

10. Write every day.

Keep a to-do list or daily planner and write down the tasks you complete every day. A psychology professor at Dominican University of California found that people who wrote down their goals, shared them with others, and held themselves accountable for their goals were 33 percent more likely to achieve those goals.

When you do these things on a regular basis, you’ll find that you slowly progress closer and closer to your goal—and then one day it becomes reality. Of course this takes time—years, in many cases. But you’ll find that the effort and the journey are well worth it.

Read this and stop feeling overwhelmed…for good!

Everywhere you turn are articles and books about how to be more productive, how to squeeze 27 hours of work out of every 24, how to double your work pace, how to do more and more all in the name of someday getting out of the rat race. Well this is about the side effects of those ideas. If we aren’t multitasking, we feel lazy. If we aren’t doing everything, we feel like we’re slacking. We compare ourselves to others who we think are doing more, having more, getting more and achieving more, and it’s driving us crazy. We feel overwhelmed when we think we have too much to do, too much is expected of us, or that a stressor is too much for us to handle. And we respond by lashing out with emotions of anger, irritability, anxiety, doubt and helplessness.

Advertising

This season especially is the most stressful time of year. Between the holidays, final exams, family gatherings and general feelings of guilt that it’s the end of the year, it’s easy to get overwhelmed thinking of all the things you still need to get done. But if you use these tips, not only will you get the important stuff done, you’ll keep your sanity while doing it!

Is this you?

Change your thought pattern-stop thinking negatively

When you feel overwhelmed, the first thing you do is start thinking negatively or begin to resent why it’s your responsibility in the first place! The first thing you have to do is to stop! Stop thinking negatively immediately. Instead, focus on the positive. If you’re stuck in traffic, think of how great it is to have some time to yourself. If you’re rushing trying to get things done by a deadline, think how lucky you are to have a purpose and to be working towards it. If you’re stressing about a final exam, think of how fortunate you are to be given the opportunity of higher education. After you’ve changed your thought patterns, you must then say to yourself “I can do this.” Keep saying it until you believe it and you’re more than halfway to ending feeling overwhelmed.

Advertising

Take a deep breath/change your body posture

When you’re stressed certain things happen to your body. You start to breath shallowly, you hunch over, you immediately tense up and all that tension drives your feelings of stress even more. Relax! Straighten your posture and take at least ten deep, cleansing, breaths. Force yourself to smile and do something to change your state. It could be as simple as giving yourself a hug or as silly as clapping your hands three times, throwing them up in the air and shouting “I GOT THIS!” Think to yourself, how would I sit/stand if I had perfect confidence and control of the situation?

Focus on right now

Now that you are in a better state of mind and are no longer thinking negatively, you need to focus on the here and now. Ask yourself this question: What is the most important thing I have control of and can act on right now? Keep asking yourself this until you have a concrete next step.

Take Action

Now that you know what’s most important and what to do about it, do it! Start with the first step and focus on getting that done. Don’t worry about anything else right now, just on what your first step is and how to get it done. Once that’s done with, determine the next most important step and get that done.

Let go of what you can’t control (the gambler’s theory)

Seasoned gamblers understand the importance of due diligence and knowing when to let go. The Gambler’s Theory is that once your bet is placed there is nothing you can do, so you might as well relax and enjoy the process. The time to worry is when you’re figuring out the best odds and making the decision of what to bet when you can actually take action. I used this one a lot in college. After an exam, there is absolutely no point in stressing about it. There’s nothing you can do. And the same goes for feeling overwhelmed. If you can do something about your situation, do it, focus and take action. But if you’ve done what you could and now are just waiting, or if you’re worried about something you have no control over, realize that there’s no point. You might as well relax and enjoy the moment.

Advertising

Relax and enjoy the moment

Stop feeling guilty

Finally, stop comparing yourself to others. If you are at your wits end trying to keep up with what you think you should be doing, you aren’t being fair to yourself. This isn’t to say that you shouldn’t strive for improvement, just don’t go overboard because you feel like you have to. Only you know what’s really important to you, and your personal success journey so focus on what your top priorities are, not someone else’s.

Everyone feels overwhelmed sometimes. The important thing is to realize it’s normal and that you can do something about it by taking focused and deliberate action. Happy Holidays!